4 Reasons Why Many Christians Don’t Go to Church

Over the past several years, much has been made about the decline of church attendance in the United States, even among those who self-identify as Christian.

“It’s no longer obvious to many people why church should play a significant role in their lives,” said Andrew Arndt, a teaching pastor at the Colorado Springs, Colorado-based New Life Church, in a recent “Essential Church” podcast episode.

Joining Arndt in the discussion on “why church?” were Daniel Grothe and Glenn Packiam, both of whom serve as associate senior pastors at New Life Church.

Among other things, the trio of pastors discussed reasons why many Christians in the United States seldom attend worship. Here, in no particular order, are four reasons covered by their conversation.

Consumerism

Packiam noted that the consumerism of modern American Christianity may be impacting church attendance, as many Christians struggle with the many options for worship that are out there.

Those who don’t attend have cited such reasons as not having found a church they like or sermons they agree with.

“It didn’t used to be like that,” he explained. “It was ‘this is the neighborhood and we’re Lutherans, and there’s the Lutheran church and we’re going.'”

“Maybe, in some ways, the multitude of options has played into that American consumeristic notion that ‘you’re the one in charge. The consumer is king.’ And so now we’ve got options and one of those options is not going.”

Arndt noted, “I think of all the U.S. churches that I have been to over the years where, you know, the closing words spoken at the service are not the great words of blessing that we get in the Scriptures, but it will be something like ‘thank you for choosing to worship with us this weekend,’ which is a little like ‘thank you for flying Southwest.’ Something is lost in that.”

Individualism

Grothe argued that another factor was “the loss of community” in the United States, a phenomenon documented in notable works like the book Bowling Alone.

“In America, we have spread out as a nation in a way that is unprecedented in time,” said Grothe, who contrasted American individualism with non-Western cultures.

“You go to Asia and you still got three generations living in the same house. And here we are in our own houses, we have broken our lives apart. We are living apart from family,” explained Packiam.

“We have change in economy which has changed the migration of people all around the globe. And so we find ourselves in new places and we don’t have these root systems of relationships that sustain us.”

Arndt noted that the church’s role in the community has also been reduced to only serve as a spiritual place, whereas before it held “so many community concerns together.”

After preaching the Gospel every day for 367 days straight throughout the 2016 presidential campaign season, Daniel Whyte III is preaching the Gospel for 1,000 days during the Trump presidency. If you think a new president being in office is the only thing needed to save America and 'make America great again,' you are woefully deceived. The church must follow through and "keep the main thing the main thing: and that is reaching unbelievers with the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and praying for their salvation, for the problem in America is not only disobedient presidents, politicians, and people, but disobedient pastors, preachers, and parishioners who have refused to obey the Lord's Great Commission which is to, 'Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature,' and who have refused to obey God's repeated commands to 'pray without ceasing' for unbelievers, believers, and political leaders." So, we encourage you to pray for the new president, but not to get caught up in the political happenings like the world does. Nothing much is going to change until people get saved and get their hearts right with the Lord. And that is what this campaign is all about.

GLORY BE TO GOD! By the grace of God, over the past 40 years, Daniel Whyte III has preached the Gospel over 6,000 times to over 4 million people in over 25 countries personally, and nearly every country of the world online. In addition, Gospel Light Society International and GLM Omnimedia Group LLC have a network of over 1,000 Christian news sites which contain the preaching of the Gospel and Christian discipleship teaching in every country of the world and in every major city of the world. BCNN1 is a part of that network. Please click here to view some of those sites.